We start with a piece of denim, about 14 by 10 inches big. Now we have two options, we can make it the easy way which we will do now, or we can make it more complicated. It depends upon the girls that we are doing the project with. For the simple purse, cut the denim in half width wise.

Fold under 1/2 inch along the just-cut edge on each piece. Pin in place.Turn it over so that the right side is up., and place a zipper under one folded side. Then pin it in place.

Sewing up the zipper with the zipper foot is a new challenge, but fun. We carefully move the needle to the correct position so that it doesn't break. We first sew up the pinned side.Then we pin the second folded piece to the other side of the zipper, and sew that up too. Open the zipper halfway. Place the denim on the table, and fold it in half along the zipper so that the right sides are together. and the three raw edges match.Pin together along the three open edges, and sew a 1/2 inch seam all around the open edges. Now we can turn it right side out( because we opened the zipper before sewing the other edges together)

There we are! We made a purse!

This simple purse helps girls learn to put in a a zipper with no fear! What a wonderful skill to learn.

Now for the difficult ( more involved) one:

We cut oddly sized pieces of fabric from our stash and pin them all over the denim randomly., making sure the sides touch each other. Along the cut edges ; we pin strips of ribbon. Then sew the ribbon to the denim, either using straight stitches or fancy stitches and colorful threads.

Look what great designs we made! After we are satisfied we follow the instruction for the zipper and finish the purse.

Here is our new purse! We are so happy with them, and I am sure that your girls will be too! Think of all of the new skills that we learn with this project-including using up scraps of fabric in a totally creative and fun way.

Please share with us pictures of the purses that you make with your very own grandmas girls, we'd love to see them! Happy sewing!